Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,800 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. This web cam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon shining down during the night at times. Plus, during the nights you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise and sunset too… depending upon weather conditions.

Aloha Paragraphs

Our attention remains on the impressivecold front approaching to the northwest – which will bring wet weather, and possible
localized flooding to the state through this weekend – first on
Kauai and Oahu, and then down the chain to Maui County
and the Big Island Southeast winds becoming south to southwest ahead of, and
along the cold front…then veering to the northwest and north,
with a chill in the wake of the front

Improved weather after the weekend…continuing through
most of the new week ahead

Extra Large to Giant high surf event… north and west shores of
Kauai and Oahu, expanding to Maui County and the Big Island –
starting later today through Sunday…dangerously high!

The weather outlook that’s been running all week…is definitely taking shape as expected. Here’s the latestweather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean. Here’s a real-time wind profile of the central Pacific…centered on the Hawaiian Islands. ~~~ We find low pressure systems far northwest, north and northeast of the state, with associated cold fronts trailing to the south…one of which is approaching to our northwest, which will be more dynamic that the last several that have pushed down through our area lately. Meanwhile, we see a high pressure system moving by just to the east of the state. Winds will generally be light to moderately strong from the southeast, carrying volcanic haze to the smaller islands locally. This will be followed by muggy south to southwest winds…ahead of this strong cold front during the weekend. Our winds will lighten up as we move into the first part of next week, likely from the cool north and northwesterly directions at first…gradually becoming more mild mannered trade winds as we move through the week.Satellite imageryshows a large patch of low clouds over Maui County, along with a prefrontal band of showery clouds coming into Kauai…and lets not forget that wide cold front that’s almost on Kauai’s doorstep! The recent dry and stable atmosphere has now been replaced by an inclement weather pattern…which will be active over our area for the next few days. Already we’re seen showers arriving from the southwest over Oahu, with more of those showers over the ocean to the southwest, now taking aim on Kauai. Maui County has gotten into the act as well, with rain arriving along our leeward coasts and slopes. Here’s thelooping radar image, showing light to moderately heavy shower activity being drawn up over the central islands on the south to southwest Kona winds…with rain just arriving over Kauai now too. Looking at this largersatellite image, which is in the looping mode, we can see this robust frontal cloud band, those bright whiter clouds, are steadily moving east and southeast towards our islands…which will impact Kauai and Oahu this evening into the night.

This cold front is steadily approaching the state from the northwest, and will swoop down through the entire chain during the weekend. The leading edge of this frontal boundary will reach Kauai and Oahu first tonight into Saturday morning, although prefrontal showers will precede it locally over the islands. The front will then push down to Maui County during the day Saturday into the night, as it slows its its forward progress…before finally bringing its precipitation to the Big Island during the day Sunday. The primary concern with this cold front, as opposed to the last several, is the expected slow pace it will take as it migrates through our area. The slower the front, the better chance it has to drop rainfall on us…which may lead to some localized flooding issues. Weather early next week will show a marked improvement, with generally fair conditions…although a bit on the cool side at first. I don’t see any more cold fronts, after this weekend’s event, out through the end of the new week. This is certainly quite a change from what we’ve seen over the last several weeks and more. I’ll be back with more updates this evening on all of the above, I hope you have a great Friday night wherever you’re spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Here on Maui, at the 3,100 foot elevation, at my upper Kula, Maui weather tower, the air temperature was 54.1 degrees at 605amon this Friday morning. It’s still dark outside at the moment, so I can’t see whether the thick volcanic haze we had late in the day Thursday…is still around this morning. I expect it to be however, and will let you know as soon as the skies get light enough for me to take a look down country from here. Otherwise, as noted above, the well advertised cold front is still on track to bring us wet weather over the next couple of days, starting first on Kauai and Oahu…as prefrontal showers today into the evening hours.

~~~ It’s now 735 am, with no clouds in the sky that I can see from here in upcountry Maui. I do however see lots of vog in our local skies, which looks to be moderately thick at the moment. Otherwise its a lovely day, although a little cool, with an air temperature of 54.9 up here in Kula, while it was a chilly 60 degrees down at the Kahului airport. I’m expecting a generally nice morning, although there are cloud patches just to the south of Maui County, and the rest of the islands too. These could easily be carried northward over the islands…especially the leeward sides a bit later in the day, with showers arriving then.

~~~ The time of this update is 1120am, with breezy Kona winds blowing, partly cloudy skies, an air temperature of 68.9 degrees…along with lots of volcanic haze too. Everything seems on track for the arrival of this well advertised cold front, in terms of timing, and the likelihood of wet weather setting in over our state. The way it looks from here, and this could change mind you, is that the eastern islands of Maui County and the Big Island will come up with the greatest rainfall totals…when everything is said and done. This heaviest part of this storm, or perhaps the correct terminology would be cold frontal cloud band, should arrive on Sunday, before things improve markedly on Monday and Tuesday.

~~~ It’s just before 5pm, and we have pea soup fog up here in Kula, with cool Kona breezes, and few light drops of moisture too. It’s a bit like Winter, and for good reason…as we still have another month or so of it…before the start of Spring. I just got word that it had been, and continues to rain down country, along our leeward sides. I’ve received two reports from different folks, that describe heavy rains falling in Kihei. It hasn’t arrived up here yet, although I’m pretty sure that it’s not far off, and this thick fog is just the precursor. The air temperature in this foggy reality has dropped to a cool 63.3 degrees at 545pm…and my weather deck is now wet from heavy misty drizzle.

~~~ This is the final update of the day, at 1010pm, with light rain falling outside…and an air temperature of 61.7 degrees. There really isn’t any wind that I can hear outside of this weather tower. Radar shows more or less northeast to southwest oriented bands of showers in a couple of areas around the state…heading towards Oahu, and over Maui at the time of this writing. The long thin line of showers, some of which are moderately heavy or even heavy, will bring some possible localized flooding when it passes through the Gathering Place island of Oahu. I’m going to have to go to bed now, although if I get woke up by pounding rain on the roof, I’m sure it will drive me out of bed, and back online to see what’s going on…and I’ll write one more paragraph just below…time will tell. Otherwise, I’ll be back Saturday morning with a new weather narrative ready for your reading.

Interesting:89% of E-Waste Is Neglected Due To Mobile Phone Recycling Popularity? – Despite the popularity of the mobile phone recycling industry, handsets only contribute towards a small percentage of the overall E-Waste accumulation.

According to a study by the U.S. environmental Protection Agency (EPA) only 11% of electronic waste is made up of mobile devices, the remaining 89% is computers, accessories, televisions and TV peripherals.

UK based recyclers Bozowi Sell My Camera stated “Because mobile phone recycling has become such a large business venture over the last decade, people forget that handsets are a relatively small part of e-waste and you should consider recycling all your electrical devices the way you would with your phone.”

43% of e-waste accretion is digital accessories and in 2010 this accumulated to a staggering 1,015,000 tons, 9% of which are digital cameras.

This increasing trend of disposing of cameras is considered to be a by-product of consumers choosing Smartphones over digital cameras. The Telegraph reported that from 2006 to 2011 camera sales dropped by £245 million, which corresponds well the massive increases in smartphone popularity over the last eight years.

Mintel Technology Analyst Samuel Gee said: “Although smartphone cameras do not typically match the quality of output of dedicated devices, the technology is consistently improving, as the quality of camera image output becomes too high for consumers to reliably distinguish between competitors.”

The same report also stated that 21% of camera and camcorder owners agree that smartphones are a better long term investment.

Torrential rain in North Kihei right now- sad for our Fourth Friday event! ~~~ Hi Mary, darn, sounds like a washout down there. Up there in Kula it is pea soup fog, with a cool breeze blowing…and a few drops of light stuff falling. I suppose folks will be forced inside, maybe for dinner and a cocktail. Thanks for checking in! Aloha, Glenn